Department of Energy Defers to U.S.G.S. on Shale Gas Estimates

Susan Phillips

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Susan Phillips tells stories about the consequences of political decisions on people's every day lives. She has worked as a reporter for WHYY since 2004. Susan's coverage of the 2008 Presidential election resulted in a story on the front page of the New York Times. In 2010 she traveled to Haiti to cover the earthquake. That same year she produced an award-winning series on Pennsylvania's natural gas rush called "The Shale Game." She received a 2013 Alfred I. duPont-Columbia University Journalism Award for her work covering natural gas drilling in Pennsylvania. She has also won several Edward R. Murrow awards for her work with StateImpact. In 2013/14 she spent a year at MIT as a Knight Science Journalism Fellow. She has also been a Metcalf Fellow, an MBL Logan Science Journalism Fellow and reported from Marrakech on the 2016 climate talks as an International Reporting Project Fellow. A graduate of Columbia School of Journalism, she earned her Bachelor's degree in International Relations from George Washington University.

August 24, 2011 | 1:27 PM

In a report released Tuesday, the United States Geological Survey increased its own calculations on the amount of natural gas within the Marcellus Shale. From their previous report published in 2002, the U.S.G.S amended its measurements of untapped shale gas 40 times higher.
But the 84 trillion cubic feet of natural gas the U.S.G.S says lies within the Marcellus Shale is far less than estimates made in July by the Energy Information Administration. The EIA reported the Marcellus Shale holds more than 400 trillion cubic feet of natural gas.
So, why the huge gap? A spokesman for the EIA says they haven’t yet figured that out. But, Jonathan Cogan tells StateImpactPA that the U.S.G.S is the gold standard when it comes to the final say on how much gas lies beneath Pennsylvania’s forests and farms.